Bidvest interim revenue climbs to R40 billion
Bidvest on Monday reported a 10.7% rise in group revenue to R39.9 billion for the half-year ended December 2017, while organic revenue growth was up 3.3%.
Bidvest is a business-to-business trading, distribution and services group, operating through seven divisions: Services, Freight, Automotive, Office and Print, Commercial Products, Financial Services and Electrical.
Trading profit rose 12% to R3.1 billion from R2.8 billion for the comparable period last year. All the South African trading operations apart from Automotive grew profits, while Bidvest Namibia delivered a disappointing performance, it said.
The Services, Freight and Office and Print divisions were the stand-out performers over the six-month period with increases in trading profit of 24.3%, 18.0% and 12.7%, respectively.
“The Services division’s organic growth in trading profit of 10.4%, is considered good in the current economic circumstances. Freight recorded several record months as bulk commodities, agricultural and liquid volumes increased markedly.”
Bidvest’s share of profits from associated companies, before capital items, increased by 26.4%.
Headline earnings per share (HEPS) increased by 12.5% to 574.0 cents (H1 2017: 510.3 cents). Basic earnings per share however, decreased by 4.6% to 560.6 cents (H1 2017: 587.4 cents) “mainly due to limited share price movements in our associates compared to material share price increases in the prior period,” the company said.
Cash generated by operations increased significantly from R1.8 billion to R3.3 billion.
The group declared an interim dividend of 255 cents per share, up 12.3%.
As announced in November 2017, Peter Meijer, Bidvest Group CFO, will be retiring on 28 February 2018. The Bidvest board of directors has approved the appointment of Mark Steynas as CFO and executive director, effective 1 March 2018.
Steyn, who is a CA (SA), joined Bidvest in May 1997 and has held various financial positions within Bidvest Freight.
Read: Bidvest to buy finance company aimed at South Africans living outside of the country
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